Honda Expands Faulty Airbag Recall

Tokyo, JAPANAs if recall-weary consumers don't have enough bad news already—Honda Motor Co. announced yesterday that is expanding an earlier recall of vehicles over concerns that the airbags inflate with too much pressure, causing the inflator casing to break and putting passengers at risk of injury or even death.

One death has been reported already, according to MSNBC.

Meanwhile, CNN Money detailed the latest recall update, which now includes 438,000 vehicles globally and 379,000 in the US. Previous recalls linked to this issue did not receive the same media scrutiny that has been plaguing Toyota, Honda's competitor.

The original recall was announced in November 2008 for 2001 and 2002 model Accords and Civics as well as some 2002 model Acura TL vehicles. It affected 3,940 US vehicles and 265 in Canada and Mexico. This past summer 510,150 cars were added to the recall, including 443,727 in the United States. The total recall now stands at 952,118 vehicles worldwide, of which 826,000 are in the US.

Honda told CNN Money that it decided to expand the recall as a precaution, even though there were no problems reported beyond July 2009. The auto manufacturer said that it could not be sure that the inflators in the recalled vehicles would work correctly.

If an airbag were to inflate with too much pressure, a ruptured casing could send shards flying out toward the occupant. MSNBC reports that the problem has resulted in 11 injuries and one death in the US.

The airbags in question are manufactured by the US unit of the Japan-based Takata Corporation. Honda claimed that the fault lies with the manufacturing process and not with the originally approved design, and is considering a request for compensation from Takata, as well as a request to improve its production line. The manufacturer of the airbags has stated that it is not aware of any defects in airbags Takata supplies to other automakers, which were not identified.

This is the second recall news coming out of Honda, Japan's #2 automaker, in as many months. In January the company announced a global recall of about 646,000 vehicles with regard to a faulty window switch.